During this weekend’s Calgary Con, someone from audience who just had a brand new baby daughter asked Wil Wheaton to explain to her daughter “what does it mean to be a nerd.” Wil Wheaton, being the awesome guy with the HEARTBREAKING STORIES, does what he does best: He explained that that newborn what it means, essentially creating a video for her future. BEST BABY GIFT EVER.

I’ll let Mr. Wheaton do all the talking, but should you not want to watch the video (or you can’t because you’re at work), I’ve taken the liberty of transcribing it for you below.

“My name is Wil Wheaton. It’s 2013. And you’ve just recently joined us on planet Earth. So welcome. I’m an actor. I’m a writer. And I’m a Dad. Your mother asked me to tell you why it’s awesome to be a nerd. That’s an easy thing for me to do because I am a nerd.

I don’t know what the world is going to be like by the time you understand this. I don’t what it’s going to mean to be a nerd when you are a young women. For me, when I was growing up, being a nerd meant that I liked things that were a little weird. That took a lot of effort to appreciate and understand. It meant that I loved science, and that I loved playing board games, and reading books, and really understanding what went on in the world instead of just riding the planet through space.

When I was a little boy, people really teased us about that, and made us feel like there was something wrong with us for loving those things. Now that I’m an adult, I’m kind of a professional nerd, and the world has changed a lot. I think a lot of us have realized that being a nerd … it’s not about what you love. It’s about how you love it.

So, there’s going to be a thing in your life that you love. I don’t know what that’s going to be … and it doesn’t matter what it is. The way you love that, and the way that you find other people who love it the way you do is what makes you a nerd. The defining characteristic of [being a nerd] is that we love things. Some of us love Firefly and some of us love Game of Thrones, or Star Trek, or Star Wars, or anime, or games, or fantasy, or science fiction. Some of us love completely different things. But we all love those things SO much that we travel for thousands of miles … we come from all over the world, so that we can be around people who love the things the way that we love them.

That’s why being a nerd is awesome. And don’t let anyone tell you that that thing that you love is a thing that you can’t love. Don’t anyone ever tell you that you can’t love that, that’s for boys … you find the things that you love, and you love them the most that you can.

And listen: This is really important. I want you to be honest, honorable, kind. I want you to work hard. Because everything worth doing is hard. And I want you to be awesome, and I will do my very best to leave you a planet that you can still live on.

So a nerd’s defining characteristic is loving things now? Okay. Maybe instead of trying to pair off into dumb little stereotypes defined by our antagonists we could just be “people.” That would be neat.

I was thinking about this a bunch recently, and @Vince and @Redd’s points touch on what bothers me about Wheaton or Chris Hardwick, they seem like nice guys when i’ve seen them on talk shows and in videos like this, but there is still this mentality that being a big fan of some aspect of pop culture makes you a special flower. I am a fan of the trivia behind movies and have huge nostalgia for aspects of pop culture. I think the best expression I have seen is to describe this is”Geeking out” over something. You get excited about things you like. We all do that. So the whole Nerd debate, especially accusing women as “posing as nerds” is such a silly moot point. (As robopanda has pointed out in the past).

I would consider myself a movie geek. It is a hobby. It does not make me part of some counterculture movement. Will Wheaton is not Abbie Hoffman.

Those dudebros go out every night and root for their favorite sports team! What nerds!

Yeah, I’m with you guys. There was a time when being a nerd (defined as someone who loves off beat culture) was a big deal. Now, it’s pretty common place. Being smart, exceptionally so, is more of a danger to the modern masses so maybe we should protect the geeks? Have we classified this? Do we need to?

I just hate this bullshit where we pick sides. Of course, it’s sort of personal for me being that I enjoy “nerdy” and “jock” shit about equally. So if I’m around nerds, I’m a jock. If I’m around jocks, I’m a nerd. The conclusion I’ve come to is that defining yourself by this narrow bullshit is fucking stupid. Also, stop bragging about being a fucking a consumer. Ugh.

It’s simply because of commerce. In his little schpeal, Wheaton says that people travel thousands of miles to do these things they love, but it’s really about people spending money on these things they love. Dungeons & Dragons and Comicon may have seemed pointless back in the day, but now they’re cash cows.

If I’d read Game of Thrones in high school (which is when book 1 was released), I would have considered it a tad nerdy, but now I’d just be some asshole hipster who did things before it was cool. I could have read a thousand fantasy stories if I were a nerd, but only GOT made it big. I would have been a nerd if I loved something purely for its form, and not for the quality of its content. The quality content, like Marvel is going to shine through. There are a million comic books that are absolute shit. But X-Men was awesome, and it became a big money maker and now it’s cool.

First you get the content, then you get the money, then you get the power. Nerds are the ones that are going to spot the quality content because they have the love that allows them the patience to sort through all of the shit.

I think that with the internet “nerdy” things that only had niche followings are no longer that because people are able to see how many other people around the world like the same stuff. Sure in your town it may not be big but there are so many people doing the same thing as you that it seems less nerdy.

“And don’t let anyone tell you that that thing that you love is a thing that you can’t love. Don’t anyone ever tell you that you can’t love that, that’s for boys … you find the things that you love, and you love them the most that you can.”

The sentiment may be nice but I’m slightly concerned that Will Wheaton’s quote could also be used by NAMBLA.

I think instead of telling little children that loving something makes you a nerd, we should just tell them to be earnest about things they like. Don’t need to put a label on not being aloof about everything.

Can’t we all just be simultaneously happy and depressed that consumer culture has finally recognized interests that used to be considered obscure and therefore nerdy are huge cash cows? The internet makes the obscure wide spread and that’s only a bad thing if you are someone whose interests MUST be soooo unique. There is no unique! Furthermore, if you popularize anything the masses will also follow, some with genuine interest and some as sheep. So that gives us comic book movies, more sci fi, more access to music etc etc. It may annoy hardcore “nerds”, but that’s entire group of people who spend too much time worrying about what everyone else thinks anyway. Which is what Will Wheaton so wonderfully said. Enjoy what you enjoy and don;t let anyone suggest otherwise.

i want to be surprised by the hate on here, but i’m not. Wil Wheaton seems like a genuinely great guy, who was just giving a fan something to remember, by saying some encouraging words to a kid who maybe in a few years will have this awesome video of an almost famous person talking directly to her. Definitely the parents will never forget it. No one is trying to label anyone. It was a room full of his fans. Wheaton seems like one of the most approachable guys in the business. Give him a break for giving his fans what they want